Productivity apps

[marquis_de_sad]

If you're anything like me you'll spend a lot of time procrastinating. Often I like to procrastinate by finding out ways to stop procrastinating, or to simply do things quicker and easier.

Here are a few programmes I use to make doing what I need to do quicker and easier.

Evernote

Electronic scrapbook. Very useful for storing small or miscellaneous bits of information in a way that allows you to find them when you need them. You can use it for free but there are limits to how much you can save per month.

Scrivener

Programme for writing long texts like books or dissertations. Allows you to have articles and other sources all together in one place, which makes switching between what you're writing and what you're reading easier. Also nice for early stages when you're really just working with disconnected notes. You could just use Word or Pages, but the little things Scrivener does makes things a lot easier. Not free, though.

Anki

Electronic flashcards. Good for remembering lots of small pieces of information, so well-suited to studying languages or science things. Only problem is you end up spending a fair bit of time making every flashcard. There are pre-made decks but Anki (and flashcards in general) works as a revision tool, not as a way to learn things, so using other people's decks is a bad idea in my opinion. Free for everything but the iphone, where it's quite dear at almost twenty quid.

HabitRPG

This isn't a productivity thing really, but basically a to-do list in the form of an RPG character. It's a nice idea, but I find myself dying too often, and I never get any of the food my animal's supposed to like. My guy is dead at the moment but I haven't bothered reviving him. YMMV. Anyway, it's free so no harm in trying it out.

What do you use to make doing things easier, CooBoo-ers?

[hoverdonkey]

I use Evernote and Scrivener for my book and iA Writer for writing other stuff. It's just one of those 'distraction-free' writing apps that syncs nicely across devices so I can write, edit on my phone and it'll be there on the mac when I get home.

[SJJames]

Evernote, Dropbox, Scrivener and Todoist.

Although it annoys me that Scrivener has no cloud capabilities or an accompanying app yet.

[shiftwork2]

Check out OneNote.  It was always a brilliant, innovative thing on Windows and now it's on all the platforms.  Has all the capabilities of Evernote (minus tags, never used them anyway) and is much more, I dunno, 'fun to use'.  The iOS apps in particular are beautiful.  I use it for notetaking, brainstorming (there's your cheap shot opportunity), as well as filing my recipes and all that shit.  Lifehack it baby.